Problems aplenty but City have to re-acquire the knack of turning good players into even better ones

Amidst the ongoing maelstrom around the future, or otherwise, of Neil Adams there has been a niggle floating around the emptiness of my mind that refuses to go away. It’s been rumbling for a while.

It concerns a horrible knack City have acquired of turning good players into average ones.

In the last two and a bit seasons (since the departure of you know who) how many players have entered the Fine City and, as a result, emerged a better player? Think about it. I’m struggling to name one.

Nathan Redmond possibly?

The ex-Birmingham man is clearly on the radar of a few Premier League clubs and some are reported to be ‘preparing a bid’ for when the January transfer window opens – in truth it would be no surprise if he were tempted away (he clearly remains our most saleable asset) – but would he depart a better player than the one who arrived?

Not sure.

The summer departures of Leroy Fer and Robert Snodgrass had rather more to do with their desire to stay in the Premier League than any significant improvement in them as players; the former’s career path boosted off the back of a fifteen minute cameo in Brazil that included a goal.

Previous Norwich City regimes have been routinely accused of curtailing to the notion of ‘little Norwich’ by ‘selling’ the club as a stepping stone from which lower league players could propel themselves toward the big time; a move to one of the big boys being reward for two or three fruitful years in Norfolk.

And in truth we were, albeit we’re currently under the auspices of a ‘we don’t have to sell’ policy. But the principle of identifying good players and improving them in their time at Norwich remains.

The list of those who have passed through and prospered is endless but if we wind the clock back a few decades, one that springs to mind is, appropriately, Mike Phelan. Bought by Ken Brown from Burnley, upon City’s post-Milk Cup relegation, the new first-team coach spent two successful seasons at Carrow Road before catching the eye of Sir Alex.

The player that returned to the north-west was an infinitely better than the one that arrived. Bought for £60,000, sold for £750,000. Stepping stone successfully negotiated and City, in that instance, with cash in the bank.

Steve Bruce followed a similar path – albeit his journey to Norwich was via Gillingham – and in a three and a half year stay saw his reputation enhance and his value grow (from £125,000 to £800,000). Again, everyone was a winner.

The examples are numerous but probably the most notable, and profitable, was the arrival and subsequent departure of Dean Ashton. Signed by Nigel Worthington from Crewe in January 2005 for a club record £3 million, his departure to West Ham just twelve months later netted the Canaries a whopping £7 million.

And, while it was accompanied by a huge furore over his playing unavailability due to an alleged hamstring injury, the upshot was a player departing with his career on an upward curve and a boost to the City coffers to match. That Ashton’s career was cut short by injury sustained while on England duty was a crushing blow for all concerned.

But his move to Green Street was prompted by his time in the yellow shirt seeing him improve as a player. The same with Bruce and Phelan. They exceeded our expectations and benefitted from their time here. Departed better players.

The point I’m making is not monetary, it’s the fact that something happened on the fields of Trowse and Colney to make them better footballers.

Naturally, along the way there have been a commensurate number of duds – for every Dean Ashton there has been a Dean Coney and for every Andy Linighan an Andy Hughes – but crucially the production line never stopped rolling.

But now it has. In some cases it has even gone in reverse.

Jonny Howson is one who, for the most part, has survived the flack and still falls in the category of ‘good player’, but is he a better one now than when he arrived from Leeds?

Alex Tettey is another whose season has been decent despite all that’s going on around him, but a better player now than when he first arrived from Rennes?

And what about strikers?

The Ricky van Wolfswinkel story needs no more telling but suffice to say you don’t loan to St Etienne a player whose reputation has soared in his time here. His career in the yellow shirt didn’t just plateau, it headed southwards… big time.

Gary Hooper is another whose Carrow Road career began on an upward trajectory but soon flat-lined. A career that started at Grays Athletic and, via a few lower league stops, peaked at Celtic Park, only for it to nose-dive once in the confines of the city walls.

I’m loathe just now to lump Lewis Grabban is this same category but, after a flying and highly-promising start, last season’s fourth highest goalscorer in the Championship has flattered to deceive. As things stand it’s nigh impossible to see him repeat last season’s return of 22 goals.

At Bournemouth he couldn’t stop scoring. Put him in a Norwich shirt and he now can’t buy a goal.

The RvW and Hooper droughts were explained away as two direct results of Chris Hughton’s penchant for ultra-caution, but it would take some extreme ‘Hughton Out-ism’ to blame him for Grabban’s recent scarcity of goals.

And that, in a waffling and rambling nutshell, is what has been troubling me. The unhealthy habit City have picked up of bringing in decent, promising players and, in the space of a few months, draining the footballing life out of them.

Naturally there’s an element of gamble to each new signing – and as mentioned earlier – some will fall by the wayside, but even the law of averages says that some should go on to flourish while decked in yellow and green.

But few, if any, do right now. It seems the best we can hope for is some lateral movement in their footballing journey. Howson, Redmond, Michael Turner even, have all trodden that particular path but for many the donning of the yellow and green shirt is the signal for a decline in form.

Too many punching below their weight. The result: a team that is lesser than the sum of its constituent parts.

And yet I have no conclusions. Only questions.

Is it a return of the much-maligned Norfolk ‘coziness’ that drains the hunger from these bright young things? Is it the expectation of the 26,000 plus Yellow Army that weighs too heavily on the shoulders and stifles the creative spark?

I don’t have an answer, but it’s that which has contributed to a talented squad – on paper at least – to perform so poorly over the last two and half seasons. Good players have become average ones, average ones have become poor and the poor ones have dropped off the radar.

It’s a sobering thought but yet another to bear in mind as all and sundry attempt to unpick the current malaise. And one that is perhaps worth considering as part of the master-plan moving forward.

I’d hate for City to become known as a club that turns the good into the mediocre but right now, to me, that’s how it feels.

It’s probably more a case of there not being just a single reason for this malaise.

In part it’s down to managers “having their favourites”. Some players are rightly ” an automatic pick” but this can lead to a comfort zone, especially when there’s little competition for places in certain positions. It becomes too easy for the manager to “go with the same XI” time and again.

When that happens, you enter something of a vicious circle, an almost self filling prophecy. Comfortable players rarely perform to their full potential.

The good managers know how to work their squad and how to utilise players on form. The most recent example is Lambert. How many players were “of the moment?” Olly Johnson, Henry Lansbury, David Fox, Steve Morison to name but a few.

Lambert had a knack for finding players at the right time to suit his needs. In some cases they only got a few games before they were discarded, but he knew how to get the best out of them, knew their limitations, and had no hesitations in discarding them if there was better options available.

It’s a ruthlessness that hasn’t been seen since with either Hughton or, during his relatively short rein, Adams.

Perhaps that’s all a bit of a tangent to your article, but it does raise a key issue.

This an area where we need to be wary of subjectivity – especially in the present atmosphere.

We sold Bruce, Ashton, Fer and Snodgrass for massive profits. It’s easy to say the first two cases reflected the players’ development, the last two something else. But it is true? I’d put Ashton in a similar category to Snodgrass – an outstanding player when we bought him, and not much different when he left. But it’s all a question of opinion.

Gazza (3) makes some great points, especially about getting the right players for the moment. I’d (still) put Jerome, for instance, in that group. But others need to show us they fit the bill too.

Very true Stew (4) – Possibly wrong to pick out specifics (although tricky to write a piece of this ilk without citing a few). But the issue, in my opinion at least, is a valid one. Would be delighted if I’m made to eat my words.

I’m struggling to think of an example from the past 20 years of a forward/midfield player who we nutured to go on to consistent higher success elsewhere..or is that a different kettle of worms?
If it is, then that’s surely a better reflection of the coaching/management at Carrow Road.
A number probably peaked with us especially under Lambert but I don’t think Ashton, Fer or even Snodders went backwards in Norfolk – probably stayed about the same level. With Redmond – for all the moves he has got, 1 goal and a handful of assists in 50+ games is a poor return – if Liverpool are prepared to pay over the odds, good for them. As for Ricky VW – now scoring in France but their league is weaker than the PL. He could have done a job for us this season.
Chris Martin is doing all right but not highest level – I’d argue you have to go back to Bellamy or Ruel Fox for examples!

Possibly we are too soft, too likeable, too generous in our expectations.
Consider Bassong, Ayala, Butterfield, Surman – all are playing regularly for teams above us in the league, but could not find a ‘home’ here

The other thing to remember, perhaps, is that time plays tricks with us. Remember the summers of unbroken sunshine as we were growing up?

Gary acknowledges that were disappointments in the past too. He says ‘a commensurate number’; I suspect many more. I can certainly remember a stream of signings who’d been brilliant against us – but turned out to be less stellar when wearing our shirt.

Maybe I grasped the wrong end of your original nettle but it is a sad fact that there are few and far between examples of real player development at the top level.
Keepers are a different breed of which we’ve (on the whole) done well in bringing through. Rob Green seems to have come out of the other side of *that* England blooper which seemed to almost destroy his career.
Redmond is a conundrum wrapped up in an enigma for me. Clearly bags of potential and you can blame recent coaching regimes all you like, but he’s had plenty of opportunities to ‘step up’ but hasn’t. At some point, it comes down to the individual surely? I’m surprised a club of Liverpool’s statue is interested.
It could be argued that as Adams’ ‘default’ winger, the likes of E. Bennett and Murphy twins have sadly been neglected.

Hang on, Russ/Gary – have we now moved on to players coming through our Youth set-up? If so, the Hughton-Adams years may prove fruitful, with plenty of talent in development. Too early to say, by definition – but in due course McFadden, King, McGeehan, Morris, Toffolo, Loza, the Murphys etc may look like a golden (and lucrative) generation.

There’s definitely a trend, but I wonder whether it’s a case that Norwich is a really good showcase for talent, rather than a creator of one (not that you couldn’t find examples).

A good player can come to Norwich, often from a lower division, shine amongst good (but not great) teammates, and then look the business for higher levels. Ashton would be a good example. He wasn’t here long enough to really improve. I’d say for a Prem team there’s a sense of security (perhaps falsely so) in buying a player from Norwich rather than Crewe.

Redmond may fit in that category. He can look really dangerous compared to those in the division and the team, but I’m not sure he’s shown vast improvement while here. Fer too was a level above much of our team last season, but I’m not sure we added much value to him as a player, certainly not what QPR paid above what we did.

I’ve never bought that Hooper has dropped in skill while here. I think he never really got his fair chance last season, despite scoring far more than RVW. I think he can do a lot more this season, given the chance.

Good article which echoes my disappointment with the failure of Club to produce any regular first teamers from the Cup-winning youth team of two years ago.
One thing I had hoped from Adams’appointment as manager was the breakthrough from one or two more of these lads,but only Josh is on the verge at present.
It has to be the Costa Colney comfort factor allied to the freedom of expression being coached out of them in order to conform to the Norwich Style (in my opinion).
Over to you Mr Phelan to use your coaching and man management skills to make these boys blossom.
Finally-Has anyone at NCFC researched the dynamics of identical twin performance?Josh has’nt looked half the player since Jacob left and Jacob is twice the player away from Josh’s shadow.
Lets get them both harnessed up in the same team and then watch them go!

Is it very different at most clubs? Good players stay good players, ‘great players’ often flatter to deceive after the hype dies down. It’s about building a team what we have lacked for the past season and a half is a leader, a talisman to galvanise the players a Holty, Hucks, Iwan, Crooky etc. However, these types come along infrequently but out of the blue so there’s always hope! Except for the foreign imports at the top clubs I really don’t think we are much different than most sides average mainly british players all much of a muchness.

@15 Jarrolder It’s an interesting observation you make in relation to the FA Youth Cup winning team, however, how many of those players were / are ready to make the step up from the Development squad to Championship football?

I don’t think this is so much a failing of our club, but football generally and the only way to overcome this hurdle is for players to go out on loan to Conference, League Two and League One clubs.

We’ve seen a few examples of this over the past couple of seasons and I suspect this w will become more of the normal route to first team football for many youth team players.

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